To meet the demand for wireless data traffic having increased since deployment of 4th generation (4G) communication systems, efforts have been made to develop an improved 5th generation (5G) or pre-5G communication system. Therefore, the 5G or pre-5G communication system is also called a ‘Beyond 4G Network’ or a ‘Post LTE System’.
The 5G communication system is considered to be implemented in higher frequency (mmWave) bands, e.g., 60 GHz bands, so as to accomplish higher data rates. To decrease propagation loss of the radio waves and increase the transmission distance, the beamforming, massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO), Full Dimensional MIMO (FD-MIMO), array antenna, an analog beam forming, large scale antenna techniques are discussed in 5G communication systems.
In addition, in 5G communication systems, development for system network improvement is under way based on advanced small cells, cloud Radio Access Networks (RANs), ultra-dense networks, device-to-device (D2D) communication, wireless backhaul, moving network, cooperative communication, Coordinated Multi-Points (CoMP), reception-end interference cancellation and the like.
In the 5G system, Hybrid FSK and QAM Modulation (FQAM) and sliding window superposition coding (SWSC) as an advanced coding modulation (ACM), and filter bank multi carrier (FBMC), non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA), and sparse code multiple access (SCMA) as an advanced access technology have been developed.
In a wireless communication system such as described above, mobile User Equipments (UEs) such as mobile phones, tablets, laptops, and the like may change a Point of Attachment (PoA) for a network. Whenever the UE changes its PoA, an internet protocol (IP) subnet to which the UE attaches may be changed. The change in the IP subnet may cause a change in an IP address of the UE.
When the IP address is changed while the UE has a data flow with a remote end, a session may be interrupted by the change. For example, when the data flow uses a transmission control protocol (TCP) connection, the TCP connection should be broken and a new TCP connection should be established. When the data flow uses a user datagram protocol (UDP) connection, the UDP connection may be maintained until the remote end is notified of the change in the IP address of the UE.
Various technologies for preventing disruption of an on-going data flow, which may be generated to the UE changing the IP address due to mobility, have been suggested. For example, various schemes such as a client mobile IP, a proxy mobile IP, a general packet radio service tunneling protocol (GTP), a mobility and multi-homing protocol (MOBIKE), a multipath TCP (MPTCP), a stream control transmission protocol (SCTP), a locator/identifier separation protocol (LISP), a host identity protocol (HIP), an session initiation protocol (SIP), and the like have been suggested for the purpose of handling UE mobility or for additional purposes besides the main purpose. Further, some applications such as instant messengers may also manage the UE mobility.
One of differences between the aforementioned schemes is a networking layer. FIG. 1 illustrates an example of mobility management schemes divided according to a hierarchical structure. Referring to FIG. 1, a client mobile IP 164 and a MOBIKE 166 operate on an IP layer 138, that is, layer-3 (L3). An LISP, a proxy mobile IP, and a GTP 170 may be classified to have an operation that is executed on a sub-IP layer which is invisible on an IP layer of a UE even though they use IP-based signaling. The invisibility is not shown by the UE since corresponding protocols are terminated on an access network. An MPTCP 158 and an SCTP 160 operate on a transport layer, that is, layer-4 (L4). An SIP 156 operates on a session layer. In-app mobility schemes 152 and 154 operate on an application layer, that is, layer-7 (L7). Higher layer schemes which are higher than or equal to L4 operate in an end-to-end type. In other words, the UE and the communication remote end is directly associated with execution of such schemes.
A plurality of various mobility management schemes operating on different network layers may be supported by one terminal. However, each of the mobility management schemes operates independently regardless of another scheme. Accordingly, it is impossible to obtain advantages of respective schemes at the same time.